


You Were Young And So Naive, But Now No Longer

by TheSightlessSniper



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Almost Canon-Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Crush, KIND of canon, Loss, Spoilers, Spoilers for many things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-05
Updated: 2017-11-05
Packaged: 2019-01-29 15:05:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12633579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSightlessSniper/pseuds/TheSightlessSniper
Summary: Carl reflects on his first crush after the apocalypse hit, and the ones that followed.





	You Were Young And So Naive, But Now No Longer

**Author's Note:**

> I was talking to someone on Tumblr about how we'd never written fics for certain fandoms we're in, and literally as we were discussing it, my brain threw this out at me and refused to let me go until it was out. Although I wasn't the most massive fan of Carl, I do think he's done a lot of growing up, and that he is a lot more mature than some of the characters twice his age...apart from that one time he ate 112oz of pudding.
> 
> Title is from the song 'Slip To The Void' by Alter Bridge.

He’d never told anyone about the way it had felt to shoot his own mother.

Square between the eyes, he had aimed, pulled the trigger, and watched the hole blossom in the centre of her forehead like a weeping rose. The smell of the gunshots was the same, but there had been something different about that one; the lingering scent of the perfume she had worn, dabbing the stale remains on her inner wrist long after they’d had access to hot running water, had permeated the air as the gun went off.

Every time he held Judith, feeding her a bottle, or dabbing the mess of food from around her tiny chin, he smelled violets, and gunpowder, and blood.

 

His first crush after the shit had hit the fan had been Sophia. The only other child he knew, and in close proximity, it had almost been inevitable.

As she had walked out of the barn, the bite on her left shoulder black and tarry and gruesome in the burning light of the sun, he’d felt like everything inside of him had gone as cold and as dead as the world they lived in.

He never forgot her contorted, snarling face, or the pretty one that had once been in its place.

 

Beth was the second; beautiful, taller, older than him by a few years. He’d caught himself imagining them growing old in the apocalypse around them, as happy as they could be when the world had gone to hell. But then she died too, the quick reflexes of a former cop putting a bullet into her brain and cutting short his dreams.

His hat had started the process of dealing with his grief. It had been his father’s—he still occasionally stole it back—but it had been on her head just as much as it had been on his own. It was something she had taken in jest, placing on her blonde locks and dancing around with Judith cradled close to her body, singing in those sweet country tones. It was something that his dad had dropped onto her head in the summer sun, chuckling with Hershel in quiet contentment when they had been at the prison as they all played the happy dysfunctional family for a few wonderful minutes. He had even once taken it off of her head, catching her falling asleep on her bunk with it awkwardly bent and digging into her cheek; he’d pulled it free and rested it across her chest, planting a chaste and nervous kiss onto her forehead and wishing that life could go back to what it was before but with her still in his life.

It was a naive dream, one that would never be, and one that had died in all possible iterations as they had buried her body at the roadside. The bullet hole had been higher up, but as they covered her up and lowered her into the ground, he was reminded of the sight of his mother’s lifeless form.

He smelled blood again.

When they had stopped one night, hiding away in abandoned cars and praying they would still be alive come morning, he’d sat outside the dead vehicle with the hat in hand, and the tears just kept coming. He cried until he was dry, head pounding and body screaming, and nobody said a word about his bloodshot sclera when they made a move just a few hours later.

Even running on empty, he still couldn’t sleep that following night without hearing Beth’s soft tones echoing hauntingly through his head like a broken record.

 

When Enid stepped in, in all her brooding quietness and independence, he had already almost given up on the dream of a life with another person; the concept of becoming attached, and falling in love with someone, only to have death take her away all over again, was almost too painful to bear. He decided to admire her from afar, and hope that he would be able to admire her for many years to come.

But hidden in the crevice of that tree, pressed together close enough to smell the soap she had washed with, and feel the brush of her hair against his collar, that familiar bubble had risen in his chest. He remembered the feeling of falling. And he remembered it again when the gunshot had stolen his right eye. And again, when she had kissed him goodbye before he had gone to seek out Negan.

He remembered it again, and again, every time they held hands, or kissed, or just lay together in the middle of the Hilltop staring up at the night sky in rare moments of peace.

He remembered the feeling of falling, and it scared the shit out of him. And that fear reminded him of why he had to be brave, and optimistic, and hopeful.

He would have to say goodbye one day. He might die tomorrow. He might drop a week from then. He might last a month, or a year, or even a decade before the inevitable caught up with him. But as he pressed a kiss to the back of Enid’s hand and basked in the sunshine, he remembered the feeling of falling again, and threw his middle finger up at misery for five minutes. When she kissed his hand back, he felt silk, and warm breath, and a smile.

Not today. Death couldn’t have them today.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope this was okay!


End file.
